The fundamental method for solar power generation is to illuminate the sunlight on the surface of solar cells. By using this power generating system, one critical factor is to enhance the absorption efficiency of the solar energy. The solar angle varies periodically over the year at different geographical locations; it also changes over the day. Thereby, tracking the location of the sun and the solar angle for acquiring the maximum irradiation has become the most important subject of solar power generation.
In addition to long-term observation of power generation, the method of short-term prediction has been valued increasingly. Because the solar irradiance received by the light-receiving surface on the solar module of a solar tracker is influenced by cloud clusters and varies significantly in a short time, the power supply by a solar power plant becomes unstable. The support by other power plants is required for maintaining the stability of the overall power generation. Nonetheless, when to increase the power generation by thermal or nuclear power generation system? How much power generation is required? How the power generation is to sustain? There is still no efficient system for providing information to these questions.
By surveying existing technologies, the China Patent Application Number CN 201410147280.9 provided a prediction method for ultra-short-term photovoltaic power generation based on cloud simulation, which built a prediction model by operating the weather data of long-term observations and enabled prediction of the weather condition in the upcoming four hours. Nonetheless, there is an extremely large error between the prediction result and the realistic weather. In addition, the China Patent Application Number CN 201110068898.2 provides an online evaluation method for active power of photovoltaic power generation based on weather information, which included light measurement apparatuses (similar to solar panels) at remote sites. According to the light irradiance on the light measurement apparatuses at the remote sites, the variation of power generation of the solar power plant can be deduced. This method suffers from difficulty in hardware maintenance. Besides, the light irradiance at the remote sites differs from the realistic result at the near site, making the method an inferior method. Furthermore, the U.S. Pat. No. 8,655,498 disclosed a method for combining multiple weather stations and solar tracking arrays. By observing the real-time weather condition surrounding the solar tracking arrays, predictions can be made. Nonetheless, the hardware cost is extremely huge.